Pages

Tuesday, 30 October 2012

Starting on Friday, this year’s Russian Film Festival will run for 10 days at venues across London, as well as selected screenings in Edinburgh and Cambridge. Now in its sixth year, and organised by Academia Rossica and the Russian Cinema Fund, it will feature UK premieres of some of Russia’s most notable recent films from both established and more recent voices.
The programme kicks off with Till Night Do Us Part, a lively-looking comedy of manners set in one of Moscow’s most opulent restaurants and revealing the scandalous lives not only of those that dine there, but also the small intrigues of its eccentric staff. Pavel Lungin, recipient of Cannes’ Best Director Prize back in 1990, will also show his new film, The Conductor, about a man bringing his orchestra to Jerusalem to perform The St Matthew Passion, and who is forced to re-evaluate his life.Curated by documentarian Vitaly Mansky, the non-fiction slate looks especially interesting. Those keen to see Russian cinema’s reaction to the recent re-election of Putin would do well to check out Winter, Go Away!, a documentary put together by 10 of the country’s most promising young directors chronicling the winter protests that preceded the presidential election. Otherwise, How I Have Eaten My Student Allowance, Milana and Anton Is Right Here (which screened to positive notices at this year’s Venice Film Festival) investigate the lives of disparate people living on the edge.Other highlights include an Andrei Konchalovsky (Runway Train) retrospective, two animation screenings, and Q&As, discussions and masterclasses with those directors, producers and actors involved.

Wednesday, 24 October 2012

Stanislav Sergeyevich Govorukhin was born on March 29, 1936 in the Perm Region (now Perm Territory). In childhood Stanislav often starved, because his mother had to take care of two children alone, whereas his father was subjected to repression.

Later Stanislav studied at the Geological Faculty of the Kazan State University, but did not worked long in his profession – very soon he became fond of cinematography and eventually became the founder of the first television studio in Kazan. In 1961 he entered the directors’ faculty of the All-Union State Institute of Cinematography. His graduation work was the film Vertical starring Vladimir Vysotsky.

During the period from 1966 to 1988 Govorukhin worked at Odessa Film Studio. He was one of the founders of the International Festival Gold Duke and then worked at Mosfilm Studio.

Altogether Govorukhin has directed about 15 films, the most famous of which include Angel’s Day, Life and Amazing Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, The Meeting Place Cannot Be Changed, The Rifleman of the Voroshilov Regiment, and others. He appeared as an actor in a number of films, among which there was Assa, Amidst Gray Stones, Bastards, The 9th Company, and others. He has written 14 scenarios and 3 books. In the early 1990s Govorukhin came to big-time politics. In December 1993 he was elected a deputy in the State Duma.

Thursday, 18 October 2012

Based on the novel of the same name by Karen Shakhnazarov, Courieris about a young high school graduate, Ivan Miroshnikov, who starts working as a courier in a publishing house for a literary magazine after he fails his exams. While delivering some documents, Ivan meets Katya and the two quickly fall in love. Ivan develops a knack for using his charm to please those around him, but just as easily seems to end up in a horrible mess by his own foolhardiness.

Sunday, 14 October 2012

More than 200 films from 50 countries will be screened at the Warsaw International Film Festival which is opening in the Polish capital on Friday.

A total of five Russian films will be presented at the festival.

Two Russian films - Till Night Do Us Apart by Boris Khlebnikov and I’ll Be By your Side by Pavel Ruminov – will compete for the main prizes, and one film – The Daughter by Alexander Kasatkin and Natalya Nazarova – will vie for the best young director award.

Other Russian films presented for the audience’s judgment include I Don’t Love You by Pavel Kostomarov and Alexandr Rastorguev, and Winter, Go Away! by a group of debut directors.

Sarychev, Shilov, Hungurov, Zabellin are soldiers of the Red Army who have become good friends. The civil war has been won but the enemy still hinders the institution of the new soviet country. White counter-revolutionaries and expedition corps do not stop their raids, especially near the border. The evil of war are felt and the country needs bread that can be bought abroad, paying with gold. The regional committee of the party prepares a great charge of gold to be sent to Moscow. Even if escorted by a group of Ceka militiamen (the organization instituted to safeguard the revolutionary power), the train is attacked by the gang of Brylov stealing the gold and kills the militians. Shilov, suspected of treachery, decides to search gold by himself .

First feature film of the director (playing also the role of the head of the outlaws) who keeping an eye on the lesson of America western, overflows with traps, changes, overturnings, romantic energy. The verses of the ballad opening the film and commenting its development are by Natalija Koncaloskaja, Michalkov’s mother. ...

Russian films made in the 1970s which deal with the Civil War (1918-21) there often have qualities which make them resemble American westerns. Nikita Mikhalkov is one of the better-known of the post-Soviet filmmakers; he won an Oscar for his 1994 film Burnt By The Sun. This very popular 1973 film was his first; he was 28 at the time. Svoid sredi... is told in an unconventional manner (especially for Soviet films of the time) reminiscent of the films of Sergio Leone. The story recounts the many exploits of Shilov (Yuri Bogaryrev) who seeks to recapture a stolen gold shipment that belongs to the Red Army. He is suspected of stealing the gold himself, and he seeks to clear his name.

October 12 marks the 55th anniversary of the “The Cranes Are Flying,” a famous Soviet movie about two lovers, Boris and Veronika, whose lives are torn by World War Two.

October 12 marks the 55th anniversary of the “The Cranes Are Flying,” a famous Soviet movie about two lovers, Boris and Veronika, whose lives are torn by World War Two.

Veronika and Boris are two people desperately in love with each other. Things are looking really good for them as the couple is preparing to get married. But the call to war sounds and Boris has to leave his bride. He enrolls in the army and falls in the battlefield.

A clip from "The cranes are flying"

The film was shot after the play of Viktor Rozov called “Forever Alive”

AMONG the leisurely pleasures of Nikita Mikhalkov's ''An Unfinished Piece for Player Piano'' are the ensemble acting of an excellent cast and the extraordinarily enterprising approach taken by this pre-eminent Soviet director. The film, only very loosely based on the early Chekhov play ''Platonov,'' is perhaps even closer to Chekhov than Chekhov was. Mr. Mikhalkov, who is also the director of ''A Slave of Love'' and ''Oblomov,'' uses this as an opportunity to capture, even embroider, the spirit of a Chekhov story. He succeeds to a remarkable degree.

''An Unfinished Piece for Player Piano,''... also resembles Mr. Mikhalhov's other movies, especially in its rapturous summery setting and in the complex irony of its closing moments. It takes place at a country home to which a dozen interrelated characters have retreated for a vacation. Platonov (Aleksandr Kalaigin, who played the film director in ''A Slave of Love''), a schoolmaster around whom much of the action revolves, arrives at the house with his sweet but simple new wife, Sasha (Yevgeniya Glushenko), only to discover than his former sweetheart Sophia (Yelena Solovei) is also in the company. A noisy but very rich landowner is played by Oleg Tabakov, who played the title role in ''Oblomov.'' A local doctor, also one of the party, is played by Mr. Mikhalkov himself.

The action is bewildering at times, because there are so many characters on hand, and because Mr. Mikhalkov is a greater stylist than he is a storyteller; the first part of the film is an extended greeting period, and it takes a while to sort out the various characters. Even here, the ensemble playing is skillful enough to weather any confusion. Mr. Mikhalkov lets the actors glide from one contretemps to another, as their idyll is given over to romantic trouble, to debates about social responsibility and the future, and to the unmasking of these wealthy characters as delusions, selfinvolvement and silliness.

At the center of all this is the troubled Platonov, who during the course of the film is led to question his life profoundly - and then arrive, in the most roundabout way, at a moment of affirmation. In an exquisite closing scene between Platonov and Sasha, who makes him believe that all will change and all will be better, the film strikes a transcendently ironic note, because the improbability of Platonov's changing has already been made plain. Mr. Mikhalkov ends this film, as he ended ''Oblomov,'' on a note of both hope and disappointment, with a view of distant landscapes and the image of a child.

Friday, 12 October 2012

This Autumn a small exhibition of Paradjanov's collages, photomontages, icons and various other art pieces is being held at Moscow's Новый Манеж (New Manezh) exhibition halls. Here is a selection of some of the exhibits on show: